Slight change in October inflation

October 31, 2014

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By MARGARET WAHITO, Some of the food items whose prices slightly went up include milk, Irish potatoes, beef and carrots all by less than 2percent/fileNAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 31 – Overall inflation in the month of October has dropped marginally to 6.43 percent from 6.60 percent in September following reduction in food and transport costs.

The food and non-alcoholic drinks index decreased by 0.45 percent while the transport index decreased by 0.29 percent.

“The drop in transport index was mainly due to reduction of pump prices of petrol and diesel in October 2014 compared to September 2014,” said a monthly report by Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS).

A two kilogram bag of sifted maize flour decreased by a margin of 4.51 percent, from Sh115.79 in September to Sh110.57, while a kilo of maize grain was sold at average price of Sh44.71 to Sh44.46 in October going down by 0.55percent.

The average price of a packet of 2 kilograms of wheat flour decreased by 3.13 percent to Sh130.30 from Sh133.13 last month.

A kilogram of onions sold at an average price of Sh89.86 in October from Sh92.87 representing a 3.14 percent drop while a kilo of spinach sold at Sh40.24 down from 40.34 in September.

A kilo of cabbages dropped with the highest margin of 7.26 percent from Sh33.24 to Sh30.83 while a kilo of sukuma wiki went down slightly by 0.06percent from Sh30.27 to Sh30.25 in October.

“The decline in food inflation resulted from observed falls in the prices of several food commodities which outweighed notable rises in the prices of others,” KNBS said.

Some of the food items whose prices slightly went up include milk, Irish potatoes, beef and carrots all by less than 2percent.

Over the same period, housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels index decreased by 0.23 percent due notable fall in the cost of cooking fuels such as kerosene, cooking gas and electricity.

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MARGARET WAHITO Margaret has been a business reporter for the past four years. She holds a Bachelors of Science degree in Communications and Public Relations from Moi University. She also holds a diploma in Film and